Moments of Color and Cloud

Poet Gloria Heffernan didn't know she was starting to write a book when she wrote the poem "Moments of Color and Cloud." She didn't know that this poem would be a threshold into the complex landscape of aging. What followed were poems about loved ones for whom aging was a continued ripening into wisdom and fulfillment; poems about friends who were struggling with illness, isolation, and loss; poems about the joys and anxieties of her own aging process. Moments of Color and Cloud is neither a book about the despair and decay of aging nor a fairy tale about the joy of the golden years. Aging encompasses a wide variety of elements and is defined by a full spectrum of both color and cloud. This book explores the process of growing older in all its richness, difficulty, messiness, and beauty.